ROBBINSVILLE — With the general election in Mercer County just a week away, two Robbinsville politicians are vying for the mayor’s seat.

Incumbent Mayor David Fried is seeking re-election to his third term, and Councilman Dave Boyne is challenging his fellow Republican. Although both lean to the right politically, Robbinsville elections are nonpartisan.

One of the biggest differences between the two is their stance on taxes.

“One of the things Mr. Fried and I have consistently disagreed upon is taxes. I don’t believe you should take a penny of taxes that you don’t need in that current year. He would rather raise taxes on a more consistent basis which if you look at the record that’s pretty much the case. We raise them every year, unless it’s an election year,” Boyne said.

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According to Fried, who is the town’s first officially elected mayor, the biggest thing concerning him is keeping the town affordable to residents.

“Taxes continue to be difficult for our residents. While we have managed to control taxes on the township side of the ledger, we need to stop the residential development in town so we can curtail the school district side of the taxes. That’s a hand-in-hand process to work with the school district to limit the amount of kids going into our schools,” Fried said.

Boyne, who has sat on council for seven years, believes it’s the appropriate time for a change in leadership.

“Dave Fried has done a number of very good things in the town, but I am very concerned about a number of issues. I don’t believe in doing things for political reasons. He had a legal fight with one of our developers and he tried to push it all the way to the New Jersey Supreme Court, when everyone knew the court would never hear the particular case. It’s just wasting money,” Boyne said.

Fried points to his record on why he should be re-elected.

“We have a lot going on in Robbinsville and I feel we have made a lot of forward progress. When I came on as mayor, we had the highest rising taxes in the county, and we now have the most stable. We are on a really good course of changing the town’s image from business unfriendly to becoming significantly more business friendly. That has really helped us because we brought in Amazon and have a number of other projects in the hopper. I really want to make sure I can see those through,” Fried commented.

If elected, the councilman would like to look at various redevelopment projects the town has going on in

“We have it (redevelopment) in a number of different areas and they don’t seem to be moving ahead. I want to find out what the holdup is in either moving forward or cancelling it, because we can’t keep spending money on consultants,” Boyne said.

He has lived in Robbinsville for 21 years and said, “It’s a great place to live, you have great recreation programs, a lot of open space, it’s centrally located so you can get to Philly in an hour and New York City in an hour, and it has an excellent school system.”

Boyne has two children who graduated from the Robbinsville school system.

After living in the town for 19 years, Fried said he is running again because this is his town where he is raising his two children.

“I want this community to be the best it can be and I had a vision to see it move forward and the residents put their faith in me to become the first elected mayor,” Fried said.

About the Author

Megan Goldschmidt is the Hamilton, Princeton, and Robbinsville beat reporter for the Trentonian. She recently launched her career in the journalism industry after graduating from Ithaca College, and enjoys learning about different areas and industries with every new story she writes. Reach the author at mgoldschmidt@trentonian.com
or follow Megan on Twitter: twitter.com/mnrgold.